Monday, April 07, 2014

Opening Day/Ring Ceremony Photo Gallery

Four days after going to the season-opener in Baltimore, I was at Fenway with my mom and Charlie for the home opener, complete with ring ceremony and flag-raising. Above, the awesome new trophied-out 2014 schedule, in front of the 2013 banner.

Beautiful day. Cold, but we've experienced much, much colder.

Everything was moved up because of the ceremony, meaning the Red Sox finished BP before the gates opened. But we did get to see a few Sox while the Brewers were hitting. Above, Lester and Lackey.

Dempster showing off the golden B. Yes, he quit, but he was there to get his ring of course.

We were the first road fans to boo Braun in the post-suspension era. Was just regular boos, no extended chanting or anything.

Overbay.

A picture from underneath, just because.

Dropkick Murphys take the field.

I snapped this a second too late to show you some red peeking out of that box. But I was very excited when I got home and noticed it actually says "OPENING DAY WS FLAG" on the box. At this point we were in front of the blacked-out seats, hoping they'd let us stay there for the ceremony, instead of our much higher bleacher seats.

These official types waved up at the Monster Seat people, who had flag-dropping duties....

And they gave the special waving signal back.

The 2013 trophy, separated from its two friends for a change.

Starting to fill up and we were still in that spot.

Looking straight down at some Boston Strong people on the CF warning track. Finally, though, we were kicked out and headed up to row 24 of section 36.

Of course I totally knew going in that we'd have a rough angle at the Monster, but we decided to just enjoy it all from our real seats. Above, the 20th-century title flags dropping one by one.

Then it was '04, followed by '07, as per the tradition.

I wondered if maybe the 2013 flag would have the B-Strong logo or some other change, but they kept it the same as the other 21st-century ones.

This is the 2013 flag coming down. Notice how many people opted to watch on the scoreboard, missing the unique angle they had. Some people are even photographing the board. So they spend their money to go to a spot right near the championship banners dropping, only to turn away and take a picture of a screen showing the same thing from a different angle. Probably could have saved some money and watched it on TV....